Haruko Haruhara
Mabase's newest resident, and an extraterrestrial investigator for the Galactic Space Police Brotherhood. She becomes the Nandaba household's maid while working to find Atomsk, the most powerful space pirate in the galaxy. She leaves Earth in FLCLimax, but returns as a teacher in Mabase in FLCL Progressive. Profile Haruko Haruhara (ハルハラ ハルコ Haruhara Haruko) is an energetic, spontaneous girl. She has light-pinkish hair and is an investigator for the Galactic Space Police Brotherhood. She claims to be 19 years old, but it is impossible to know if that is true. In the first episode, she runs over Naota with her Vespa and hits him in the head with her guitar. Shortly after, she was hired by Naota's father, Kamon, as a house-maid. She is called Haruha Raharu (ハルハ ラハル) by Amarao and Jinyu; this could, however, be just another nickname, or perhaps her real name based on its use by Jinyu and the credits of Progressive Personality She has a tendency to switch between a variety of different dispositions to others on a dime, making her difficult to read and unpredictable. She can be very persuasive and stand-offish sometimes to get what she wants. When around the Nandaba men, she is often either promiscuous or found in suggestive situations. She can also act like a mom, a lover or a maid depending upon her mood. While split from Julia Jinyu, Haruko acts a little different. She's a lot less manipulative and far more aggressive with her approach. She is very playful and selfish, intent on getting what she wants by any means without reason. Haruko is deceptive and remorseless of the the things she has done. Ultimately, she is cause of the events of FLCL and most of the FLCL series, making her the true antagonistic catalyst of FLCL. On occasion, however, she does show positive traits akin to a more antihero type. Appearance Haruko is a tall, slender and unearthly young woman with cat-like facial features. She sports a pale complexion, salmon-colored bob cut styled into a medium-length flare, and yellow-colored eyes that are also cat-like. Her usual outfit is a bright red coat, black pants, white boots, and a white scarf. She wears many other outfits in the series, but one fashion accessory she is never without is a large metal bracelet on her left wrist. The bracelet acts as a kind of radar device, reacting to N.O. power and letting her know where Medical Mechanica robots and/or Atomsk might be. In FLCL Progressive, as a result of Julia Jinyu splitting off from her, Haruko's hair is slightly shorter, spikier, and orange, but she retains her yellow eyes. After reabsorbing Jinyu, Haruko's pink hair is restored and her eyes become red. This could be due to the both of them having absorbed some of Atomsk's power prior to splitting. Her belly also becomes larger after eating Jinyu, making her appear pregnant, but it eventually shrinks back to normal size. In FLCL Alternative, her eyes seem to have turned back to their normal color. She now has a different hair style, letting one bang loose to the left, with the top half of her hair tied in the back, and the lower half spiky. Story Powers Haruko has a wide array of abilities, both from the tools at her disposal and her own natural strength. Most notably, she rides a super-powered Vespa that allows for flight and super-speed, and wields an electric bass guitar that opens N.O. channels. She also possesses super-human strength and can consume and absorb the strength of other beings, as seen when she attempted to absorb Atomsk and when she devoured her other half. In LooPQR, Raharu and Jinyu generate a red and blue aura respectively during their fight. It is possible they both carry remnants of Atomsk’s power. Haruko has also demonstrated she can hypnotize weak-minded people. Relations Naota Haruko first meets Naota when she runs him over with her Vespa and proceeds to beat him in the head with her bass. He thinks she is insane, especially when she continues to follow him and eventually gets a job working as a maid in his house. He tends to be very outraged at her wild behavior, save for when she does something cool or impressive. Over the course of the series, he develops feelings for her, which he reveals in the final episode. However, to Haruko, Naota is nothing more than a tool in her grand plan— all she really needs from him is his head, which is an N.O. channel from which Atomsk can be freed. She merely manipulates his feelings, since she doesn't care much for anyone or anything besides her own desires. However, the boy eventually seems to have grown on her enough that she allows him to kiss her and even offers to take him with her before noting he is just a child. She parts with him on friendly terms, leaving her bass for him. Mamimi Mamimi and Haruko do not have much in the ways of interaction, but as Naota's personality changes because of Haruko, Mamimi finds herself liking him less and rejecting him more. While Mamimi never shows jealousy or anger toward Haruko directly, she cuts off all ties with Naota and leaves completely in the final episode, even though she knows Haruko has left. Kamon Naota's father is interested only in his wants. His main desire is the lovely Haruko, who would make the perfect young bride. Since Kamon pines almost blindly for her, Haruko is easily able to use him for her own motives. Shigekuni Naota's grandfather also thinks Haruko is quite attractive. While he is too old for her and doesn't pursue her, he still finds her arousing and thinks her baseball skills are intimidating. Canti Canti is the robot that pops out of Naota's head in the first episode because of Haruko hitting him with her bass. Thinking that by hitting him, she will free Atomsk, she hits Canti, only to break the connection between him and Atomsk (thus, he turns from red to blue). He becomes an obedient, helpful robot afterward, and listens to both Haruko's chore commands and her orders when engaged in battle with other robots. Miyu Miyu While Miyu Miyu (Naota's cat) tends to be unfriendly, he allows Haruko to play with him quite a bit, and rather roughly. Haruko uses him as a method of communicating with the mysterious Fraternity which she is a part of. Amarao Amarao was Haruko's channel in the past, and thus is trying to keep Naota from ending up like he did. However, Naota has a much stronger channel connection than Amarao does, so Haruko actually finds him of use, unlike Amarao. Judging by the way Amarao acts around her and while talking about her, it is hinted that he has some feelings for her, just as Naota does. However, she's a troublesome alien for someone in his line of work, so those feelings are diluted by his anger towards her, both for what she did to him and the trouble she causes. Haruko finds Amarao to be completely weak and pathetic and doesn't fail to let him know. Julia Jinyu Jinyu is a part of Haruko's being that split off from her when she attempted to absorb Atomsk's power. In contrast to Haruko's more brash and reckless personality, Jinyu is the relatively calmer voice of reason who wishes to protect Mabase and Atomsk. Despite their conflicting interests, which often results in physical confrontations between the two, Haruko seems to tolerate her and at one point even works with her against Medical Mechanica. Haruko eventually decides she can no longer tolerate Jinyu's existence after constantly being asked to join her. Haruko ends up battling Jinyu to gain dominance over their fusion, but Jinyu lets her guard down, and ends up being devoured and absorbed back into Haruko's body after accepting defeat. Hidomi Haruko first encounters Hidomi when she assumes the role of her class' homeroom teacher. As with Naota, Haruko cares nothing for Hidomi and sees her as only a tool to acquire Atomsk's power. Haruko constantly attempts to manipulate Hidomi, as well as the rest of her class, to achieve this end. Eventually, after seeing Haruko's true nature and intentions, Hidomi comes into direct conflict her, doing whatever she can to stop her ambitions. Ko Ide Like Hidomi, Ide first encounters Haruko when she assumes the role of their class' homeroom teacher. Haruko cares nothing for Ide other than his N.O. channel capabilities. She enjoys teasing him and looks down on him heavily. Atomsk While Haruko is willing to chase him across the galaxy, Atomsk seemingly has no interest in her. She is supposedly in love with him, but knowing Haruko's personality, she is more likely in love with his vast power. This is, however, changed in FLCL Progressive when it is revealed that the Julia Jinyu half of Haruko personally loves him while Raharu only obsessively covets his power. While fused together, Haruko's feelings are unclear towards Atomsk. When Naota is merged with Atomsk, Haruko goes into a rage and yells, "Nobody's going to eat that but me!" This most likely refers to the fact that, in order for Canti to gain Atomsk's power, he eats Naota (who has the N.O. channel connection). Haruko must similarly want to eat Atomsk to merge powers and identities. When Atomsk is freed, he dashes off at a brilliant speed, leaving Haruko behind. She is upset that she's lost him again, but she simply hops onto her Vespa and again takes up the chase. In FLCL Progressive, the end credits of the first episode made it apparent that Haruko had gained Atomsk's power for herself at some point in the past of this series, but the experience of absorbing him caused her to split into two people, one with slightly shorter orange hair that resembles herself and the other a more unique-looking woman called with white hair called "Julia Jinyu". Jinyu is trying to prevent Medical Mechanica and Raharu from robbing Atomsk of his freedom, while Raharu is intent on finding him to absorb his power again. When pretending to pregnant to her hypnotized class, she showed them a picture of her “hubbie”, which resembles a crude drawing of Atomsk, a red bird. Gallery Main: Haruko Haruhara/Gallery Trivia *Haruko drives a 1965 Vespa Super Sport 180. In FLCL, its license plate's jurisdiction is labeled Mabase (Japanese: マバセ) and its serial number is "56-56" (Japanese: goro-goro). 56-56 is a homophone for ごろごろ (gorogoro) which is an onomatopoeia sound used for thunder, purring, scattering, and inactivity. In FLCL Progressive its license plate's jurisdiction is labeled Oozu (Japanese: オオズ) and its serial number is "43-43" (Japanese: shisan-shisan). This is likely because 42 in Japanese is considered an unlucky number as it is a homophone for "die" (Japanese: 死に, shini), and thus is not used for license plates; 56 is also considered an unlucky number when paired with 42, as 42-56 is a homophone for "time to die" (Japanese: 死に頃 shini-goro). 43 can be read as a homophone for "scattered" (Japanese: 四散, shisan). **Oozu is also the name of a place containing a facility Aiko's father and Eye Patch visit with Canti's shell *The name "Raharu" can be found in her last name if read backwards in the Japanese alphabet. That is her given nickname by two characters in the series. Category:Characters Category:Females Category:Principal Characters Category:Progressive